By popular demand, here is the wine list from the 2005 SLAC Summer Institute (SSI). One of my duties as SSI program co-director is to choose the wine that we serve with the Institute dinners. It’s a tough job, but someone’s gotta do it.
It really isn’t so easy. Honestly. We have a strict budget. I can’t just order a case or two of Chateau Margaux! (Actually, I’ve never had the pleasure of tasting Chateau Margaux….sigh.) I have to average around $6.00/bottle. And, I must admit, I know little about wines that cost $6.00/bottle. And, I can’t serve just any everyday plonk – I have a reputation to maintain! So, to ensure quality, I taste. As I said, it’s a tough job… I start looking for bargains a few months in advance. Whenever I see something interesting, and cheap, I buy a bottle. I taste it immediately, and if it passes muster, I immediately return to buy a bunch. Good cheap wine sells out quickly and you gotta be fast. All in all, I usually taste about 2-3 cases worth. (Yes, at my own expense.) Sometimes I end up running to the sink to spit the stuff out. Sometimes I end up buying some bottles for myself.
So….drumroll please….here is the 2005 list. Average cost $6.29/bottle.
White:
Meridian Chardonnay, Santa Barbara County – 2004, $5.99
Grand Cru Chardonnay – 2003, $4.99
Sartarelli Verdicchio – 2003, $4.99
Aranacio Grillo – 2003, $5.99
Kenwood Sauvignon Blanc – 2004, $8.99
Red:
Charamba Duoro Tinto – 2000, $5.99
Bogle Old Vines Zinfandel – 2003, $8.98
Columbia Crest Merlot, Grand Estaters – 2001, $8.99
Deakin Shiraz – 2004, $6.99
Rosemount Estate Shiraz (Diamond Label) – 2003, $7.99
Marques de Riscal Tempranillo – 1999, $7.99
September 13th, 2005 at 2:56 pm
Where do you do your wine shoping?
And have you ever been accused of casting pearls before swine?
September 13th, 2005 at 3:27 pm
hey, a wine post! yea! i have this odd feeling that i have to comment, so here goes:
1. i can now put a feather in my cap b/c i’ve tasted chateau margaux. granted, it was only a taste of ’99 margaux when the vintage was released at a tasting of ’99 bordeauxs. i was very impressed, but i’m probably very easily impressed when it comes to classified growth bordeaux. yeah, i know, it’s not much of a feather…
2. have you tried any wines from around provence, specifically nimes? these are favorites of mine in the under $10 price range, where i certainly am almost always buying. also some sicilian wines can be good for around there. and i’m just about to finish off a case of a $3 french vin ordinaire, which i was pretty fond of (well, at least for $3).
3. any comments on the Charamba Duoro Tinto? it’s the most interesting wine on that list to me…
September 13th, 2005 at 3:40 pm
Hack – I generally shop at K&L Wine Merchants and the Wine Club.
Collin – too bad it wasn’t the 2000! Yes, I enjoy wines from Provence, I just didn’t find any for the Institute this year. The Duoro and the Temparillo were both great!
September 13th, 2005 at 3:43 pm
If you do ever get a chance to taste a Margaux, jump on it. I had the good fortune to share an ’82 with a friend and her wine connoisseur father a few years ago, and it was divine.
Care to comment further on the Rosemount?
September 13th, 2005 at 4:13 pm
eh, i’ll take what i can get. and thanks for the suggestion on the duoro. i’ve yet to try a portugese wine, so i should probably get around to it, considering this seems to be right around my budget…
September 13th, 2005 at 4:24 pm
Margaux is well worth it – you need to go to better class of meetings!
I once managed to get a Cambridge cellarmaster to prove by experiment that his favourite Margaux vintage was better than the one I had been offered at the previous stop. He was right, they had a better cellar.
Try TJs for surprisingly good wines at bargain prices; or go directly to the wineries, if in doubt go to Bonny Doon! Eclectic but fabulous. Don’t know that you can get down to $6 per bottle for anything though ( http://www.bonnydoonvineyard.com ) easy drive from SLAC. Looks like they’re all above $10 per bottle though.
September 13th, 2005 at 9:20 pm
It’s difficult to find a good bottle of dry, complex, full bodied wine under $10, but there are many bargains in the $11 to $14 class. C\^{o}tes du Rh\^{o}ne wines are often good values.
October 25th, 2005 at 1:05 am
[...] We begin work in September and essentially meet once a week for the rest of the year. SLAC has been doing this for 34 years now and it doesn’t get any easier. This is my 4th year, and I’m just now getting the hang of it. Each program director contributes something unique to the Institute. Here are my top accomplishments: (i) overhaul the mailing list for the announcements/posters. Turns out, before I joined, SSI had been using the original mailing list, drawn up in 1971. Yes folks, we were sending our announcements to dead people! And guess what, they weren’t sending their students…we now insist that only living physicists inhabit our mailing list. (ii) The t-shirts now have the emblem printed on the front instead of the back. This is quite important for physicists with long hair. (iii) I’m in charge of the wine for the dinners. I no longer have to bring bottles from home. (iv) We have a question box for the discussion sessions, where particularly shy students can submit written questions to the lecturers, rather than have to ask them out loud in front of 300 people. [...]
July 19th, 2006 at 5:54 pm
[...] We have a variety of other activities as well. There are 5 afternoons of topical talks, one each on results from the Tevatron, B-physics, astrophysics, neutrinos, and heavy ions. Alternating afternoons we hold discussion sessions where the students get to grill the lecturers. This evening is the first of 2 poster sessions where the students will present their work. Next week is the annual SLAC versus Summer Institute soccer game. And we have 3 dinners which give the students the chance to mingle with each other and the lecturers and drink good wine. Last night was Hawaiian night, unfortunately SLAC’s resident hula dancer had broken her ankle and could not perform. [...]